Critical Reasoning

How to imporve CR


I have followed the manhattan strategies or instructions but unable to

I am able to eliminate 3/5 choices but the last 2 I am unable to get the right answer.. I am always chosing the last one

Can you please advice

example this one - I was left with A and B but chose B instead of A(right answer please advice

195.
A proposed change to federal income tax laws would eliminate deductions from taxable income for donations a
taxpayer has made to charitable and educational institutions. If this change were adopted, wealthy individuals
would no longer be permitted such deductions. Therefore, many charitable and educational institutions would
have to reduce services, and some would have to close their doors.
The argument above assumes which of the following?
(A) Without the incentives offered by federal income tax laws, at least some wealthy individuals would not
donate as much money to charitable and educational institutions as they otherwise would have.
(B) Money contributed by individuals who make their donations because of provisions in the federal tax laws
provides the only source of funding for many charitable and educational institutions.
(C) The primary reason for not adopting the proposed change in the federal income tax laws cited above is to
protect wealthy individuals from having to pay higher taxes.
(D) Wealthy individuals who donate money to charitable and educational institutions are the only individuals who
donate money to such institutions.
(E) Income tax laws should be changed to make donations to charitable and educational institutions the only
permissible deductions from taxable income.

Check out this link. Hope it helps.

https://www.beatthegmat.com/improving-cr ... tml#417987

+1 for the Powerscore CR Bible - IMO it's the best CR resource out there.

In general, that's great if you can get the questions narrowed down to 2. A lot of times, it just takes practice. For this specific question, our premise states that new tax laws would eliminate tax deductions for people who donate to these charities. The conclusion is that these charitable institutions will have to cut back a great deal because of this. We are looking for an assumption to bridge this gap. Remember when choosing an assumption - for the conclusion to hold, the assumption must be true.

You've already narrowed it down to A and B so let's look at both:

A - This answer states that without incentives, at least some of the donors would not donate as much money as they would have without the deductions. This seems like a good answer. To test this, try negating it. If the wealthy individuals would donate the same amount of money even if they couldn't get tax deductions, then the charities would not have to close their doors. Since the argument does not hold when we negate it, we know it must be a true assumption.

B - This answer states that the only source of money for these charities comes from people who rely on incentives. This answer is a bit extreme. The argument definitely assumes that a significant portion of the income from these charities comes from wealthy donors who rely on the law - the charities wouldn't be in danger of shutting down without the funding from wealthy individuals who rely on the tax incentives. But the word ONLY is an extreme. Even if someone else donated $1 to the charity, the assumption would not be valid. Therefore we cannot make the assumption that the charity gets no other source of funding.

Hi venmic, I also always have problem with 2 final choice as you previously. However, the thing helps I improve in almost kind of questions CR is stick to the conclusion when choosing answer choice. The second thing is you need to understand the premise and the logical flow. The final thing is practice to build your critical thinking solidly. If you have own approach and feel it effective. Just stick it and improve.

My advice is based on the most important thing beside 2 valuable books: the CR Bible and MGMAT CR.

Hope that helps